"I'll give a dollar," said Tootsie recklessly.
"That's too much," said Skippy, with an appearance of generosity. "I'll sleuth for a quarter a day. Cash in advance. But my orders go. Savvy?"
Tootsie paid down the fee, and following instructions departed next morning with the family for the beach, while Skippy, returning across lots, wriggled on his stomach over the lawn and slipped into the house by the cellar window. For three days Tootsie duly paid out her quarter and received the most comforting of reports. On the fourth day, however, a discussion arose.
"'Course if you sit there, no one's goin' to come," she said, fingering her last quarter. "I know it's Clara by the look in her eyes."
"Sit there! What kind of a sleuth do you think I am?" he said indignantly. "Look here. See that phonograph—see anything queer about it? Pick it up."
Instantly the grating sounds of a dinner bell were heard and a horrible crash.
"Lookout! Don't drop it, you chump! See that string that passes down the back of the wall and into the closet?" said Skippy, proudly exhibiting a patent alarm which he had constructed with the aid of a delicately balanced dishpan. "I'm in the dining-room under the table. Well what?"
"Heavens! If Daddy ever sets that off!"
"He won't. You bet, I'll see to that," said Skippy hastily. "Well what? Do I get another quarter?"
There was a slight mental indecision after which the quarter came reluctantly to the detective. Tootsie went thoughtfully down to the beach. The new method did redound to the stability of the phonograph, but was Skippy really working as rapidly as he could?